


No need to give it a name

by Marium



Series: Regan week [4]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Asshole negan, Developing Relationship, M/M, Rick and Negan on their own in the wild, Rick meets Negan after being separated from his group, at first
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-07 10:43:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11621901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marium/pseuds/Marium
Summary: Separated from his people and alone, Rick ends up teaming up with a potentially unstable and assholeish stranger named Negan against his wishes and better judgement. However, as Negan slowly warms up to him and their relationship becomes closer, Rick finds Negan's presence is something he couldn't do without.Regan week, day 5 - Wedding





	No need to give it a name

Rick couldn’t tell when it had happened. He couldn’t tell if it had happened at some certain point, either, or if it had been happening from the very first moment he and Negan had laid eyes on each other. Maybe it was still happening, changing a very little bit with every second that came and went. But on the other side, he felt that whatever was between him and Negan had always been there and would always be, changing on the surface but steady and constant where it ran deep down. It had taken some time for them to reach the point where they could feel it, but there it was.

He wasn’t sure what he would call it, if the need to name it ever came up. But he didn’t think it ever would. It didn’t need a name. It was there, and that was what mattered. Negan was there, and that was all that mattered. Rick was content with things the way they were, and the best part was that he knew Negan was as well.

Rick had been wandering on his own for some time when he met Negan. He didn’t know what had happened to his people after he got separated from them, but he knew they were alright. He had to believe that, that Michonne and Daryl and Carol and the rest had made it without him and that they were taking good care of his children. He had to believe it because he knew he couldn’t make it otherwise. He would lose his head again, he’d go reckless, and he’d die.

On his own as he was, there was no point in trying to find somewhere stable to settle down. He couldn’t take any strong place on his own, and while there was always the option of trying to do what Morgan had done in that heavily protected house back in his town, Rick honestly felt more secure being always on the move. If he didn’t have anyone at his side, he didn’t want to risk drawing any group’s attention to himself.

And it was like that, seeking refuge in a different place every night, how he met Negan. He was just securing the lock on the door of the house he was entering when he felt a gun being pressed to the back of his head.

“I’ve had a fucking long day so I swear to fucking God almighty that if you’re trying to bring me trouble I’ll turn you inside the fuck out.”

“It’s good luck that neither of us is looking for trouble, then.”

Rick raised his hands high in the air immediately, back straight as he shut his eyes and cursed to himself. When the man reached around him to get his weapons Rick protested and tried to turn around on instinct, but the gun pressing against his skull shoved him until his forehead met the door, so he could do nothing but try to bite back a scalding curse and hope for the best.

Only when all of Rick’s weapons, or at least the ones the stranger could find, were off Rick did the man back off. The gun still menaced his brains, but the presence took a few step backs and after a tense second grunted, “Turn around.”

A man that was at least a handful years older than Rick but still clearly healthy and strong was the threatener. He was taller than Rick, his tee gave room to no doubts about his muscles, and a few scars here and there clarified that it wasn’t all just appearance. His eyes, narrow and cold, impassively glared down at Rick’s face.

“What the hell do you want here, cowboy?”

Despite the gun still aimed at him, Rick couldn’t help a snort. “It’s almost night and I need a place to sleep. What do you think I might want here, exactly?”

That answer was the most logical one, Rick knew that, but it still took half a minute for the man to shrug and lower his weapon, although his eyes still remained fixed on Rick like he might jump at him any moment. Quite ironic, Rick thought.

“Alright, alright! Jesus, don’t get your panties in a twist. It’s not like I actually shot you, right?” he huffed, rolling his eyes as if Rick not liking having a gun pointed at him was something laughable.

“Sure looked like you were going to.”

The man shrugged. “Was going to. Still might. But how about we try this again? Hi, I’m Negan.”

The answer took a few seconds to came, hesitant and untrusting. “... Rick.”

“Well Rick, looks like we’re gonna be roomies for the night” Negan declared, the cheerful tone in his voice not belonging to a man still holding a gun in his hands. Rick rolled his eyes, and seeing that the hostility seemed to have gone down, reached for his weapons that had been left lying on the floor. Immediately Negan’s gun was up again, aiming between Rick’s eyebrows. Rick held his hands up and took a step back.

“Now, just how fucking stupid do you think I am? I can allow you to nestle up all nice and cozy with me in this nice piece of shit house, but letting you have something to kill me in my sleep with? Not happening, prick. This stays with me and you had better be goddamn thankful if I let you keep any of it in the morning.”

“Oh, so I’m supposed to believe you won’t kill  _ me  _ in my sleep?” Rick grunted behind gritted teeth. Negan hummed good-naturedly.

“Sucks ass, doesn’t it? But you’re gonna have to make do, serves you right for trying to sleep in my damn place. You just behave and you might walk out of this place tomorrow and we’ll never have to see each other’s ugly mug ever again.”

Rick couldn’t do anything but turn his hands into tight fists and glare. He walked upstairs under the supervision of Negan’s gun and then went to the safest room he could find.

He barely slept that night. He had the feeling that Negan was pretty much the same.

As luck would have it, Rick wasn’t fortunate enough to get rid of Negan the next morning. He woke up - huh, looks like he actually managed to sleep a bit - to the feel of Negan’s hand over his mouth. He jumped awake and tried to push the man away, but when Negan hushed him quietly and jerked his head to the side, to the wall, Rick was silent for long enough to hear all the groans coming from outside.

“Looks like we’re gonna have to see a little bit more of each other than either of us would wish for” Negan commented lowly after almost a minute of listening to the walkers. “It’s not quite a herd, but it’ll be a handful if we don’t handle it together. C’mon, I’ll even let you have your toys back for this” Negan commented with a wide, child-like smile.

Rick shrugged Negan’s hands off, glaring daggers at him as he stood up to go check on the window discreetly. Definitely enough of the dead out there for him to need help getting out. Rick cursed his luck as he headed out of the room without as much as directing a word or another look at Negan while the man followed him with comments about how much he loved Rick’s manners.

After a few minutes trying to decide the best thing to do and Rick getting his gun and knives back - ‘they’re lame, anyway, my Lucille is far, far cooler’ Negan commented as he almost shoved the end of the barbed bat in Rick’s face - they decided that the best way to go out was drawing as many walkers to one side of the house and hope that there were few enough in the opposite one for them to be able to be clear the way out. After three minutes of throwing plates, glasses, and other loudly breakable stuff out a window and seeing the few startled walkers draw in the rest, Rick and Negan gathered at the main door. It was definitely quieter. Rick nodded, Negan winked cheekily as if it was a game, and then they slammed the door open simultaneously.

There was enough activity at the other side of the building for the walkers to be manageable. Rick took the right side, Negan took the left one, and they slashed their way out of the bulk of the not-quite-herd. Rick didn’t know if Negan was keeping an eye on his back, but he was definitely keeping one on Negan’s, out of instinct mostly. Once they deemed themselves safe enough, they nodded at each other and started running away, leaving behind the rotting arms trying to catch the two of them in their deadly grasp.

Rick could have taken any chance to take off after that, he knew that. But at first they stayed together for the sheer factor of safety in numbers, the clear reminder of what walkers could be in large numbers still clear in their heads. Then Negan started filling the silence with random nonstop chatter and Rick felt some sort of social awkwardness that had no place in the apocalypse at the thought of turning away while Negan was mid-sentence, so he continued tagging along. It felt kinda right.

The next thing Rick knew, night was approaching and Negan started bugging him about how  _ they _ should find shelter. They had reached a little town, and Negan literally dragged Rick into the house he deemed looked safest, shoving him inside.

“Make sure there’s no rotting assholes in there, I’ll watch out here for any roaming around” he ordered with a perfect, wide smile, despite the fact that the area was clearly clean. Before Rick had any chance to complain, Negan slammed the door shut on his face, loud enough to draw any dead in the house towards him.

Asshole. It was fitting that Negan used that word that much.

Twenty minutes later, when they were sure the house was safe and Negan was happily prancing around the place, Rick was left stuck in place, eyes wide as a realization dawned upon him: He was partnering up with Negan.

For the first time since he was separated from his people, his children, he was working with someone else. Someone like Negan, of all people.

Negan didn’t allow him the time to dwell too much on it, though; he snapped Rick out of it by obnoxiously claiming that anything nice was his, and Rick could keep whatever Negan didn’t want. Rick scowled deeply and proceeded to beat Negan in getting the good stuff first.

  
  


Something Rick noticed about Negan was that for all his constant lively, crude talking towards a ‘bitch-faced like you’re smelling a bucket of shit, for fuck’s sake’ Rick, he was actually quite cold. It was something different to the very obvious way in which he always tried to use Rick as lightning rod for danger, a living human bait. For all his buffon-like behavior, Rick couldn’t help but be taken aback by the sheer apathy he could see in Negan’s eyes. Negan was as distant as if they had never even seen each other.

And then one day, when Rick was skinning a rabbit they had managed to catch, Negan enthusiastically clapped him on the back. Rick slipped and almost cut his hand.

“A congratulation is in order, my dearest friend!” he exclaimed, ignoring Rick’s glare. “With this beautiful day it’s officially two weeks since we met.”

“So?”

“That means you’re the one who’s lasted longer without biting the dust since all this shitstorm started, you dumbass. I expected you to die in the first three days. Kudos on impressing me.”

Rick scoffed. “You expected me to die?”

“I still do” Negan replied carefreely, dropping down to sit beside Rick. “You’re just taking longer than I gave you credit for. You’re not gonna survive, but still impressive. You get a damn applause.”

Negan clapped three times, barely able to hold back his laughter as he looked at Rick’s offended, angry, open-mouthed face. Who the hell did this guy think he was to decide what Rick could or couldn’t do?”

“You seem to know a fucking lot about me for someone who has known me for two weeks” Rick gritted out, leaning into Negan’s space to stare right into his eyes. “You don’t know what I’ve done or what I’ve survived. So why don’t you shut the fuck up?”

“Jesus fuck, Rick, mind your blood pressure. Don’t take it personally. You’re gonna get killed, so what? That’s what people do nowadays.”

“Well, you’re people too” Rick pointed out with a raised eyebrow. “That mean you’re planning on getting offed sooner or later too?”

Instead of an answer, Rick got a resounding, deep laugh, so loud that Rick cursed and looked around frantically, worried it might draw walkers to them. Negan poked his tongue out between his teeth as he struggled the urge to laugh again.

“Oh my fucking god-damn, Rick, nice one. You see, I am a person, but I’m not  _ people _ . I’m motherfucking Negan. Know the difference.”

The conversation died down after that, little amused grins decorating Negan’s face every now and then, while Rick was just too weirded out by Negan’s reasonings. The man was clearly either a psychopath or incredibly unstable, with all his joking and indifference about Rick’s supposedly unavoidable demise. He should leave him the first chance he got.

Instead, it turned out that Rick just wouldn’t stop defying Negan’s expectations of him. The man first gave Rick a cocky third week, then a slightly impressed month. Confusion, bewilderment and fondness went one after the other as Negan extended bit by bit the date of Rick’s death. Eventually he just stopped talking about it. When questioned by Rick, Negan just grinned at him and shook his head.

It turned out that the more Negan believed in Rick’s ability to not leave him alone eventually, the closer their relationship became. Negan’s tendency to fill the silence stopped being about just talking and talking for no reason other than being annoying, but something he did because he wanted Rick to know everything that crossed his mind. Rick never answered, but Negan knew he was listening and appreciating it all the same.

First it was natural for Rick to laugh and smile at the man, and then he found it natural to casually touch one another. Next it was lying next to Negan at night, soon after followed by the first time Negan drew Rick into his chest, holding him close.

Rick was the one to kiss Negan first, and Negan returned the favor by taking it to the point where he was hushing and taking Rick’s moans into his mouth as he slowly worked them both to climax. Rick took delight on the soft, quick kisses Negan put all over him as the man whispered soft praises.

Negan didn’t cry when he told Rick about Lucille, but his voice was strained and his hold on Rick’s naked shoulder became tight until he loosened it the second he was done. Rick took Negan’s head in his chest and caressed his hair until the man had completely calmed down, relaxed and lax on his hold.

Some time later, Negan did the same for him when Rick spoke about Lori and Shane, and about how he had gotten separated from his group, his family, while trying to get them away from danger by drawing it away himself, and finding that they were gone by the time he managed to come back. He could only assume they had had to leave for their own safety. He didn’t resent them for it.

Rick wasn’t sure how long he had been with Negan. A year, maybe? Out there on their own for so long, it was hard to know, but he knew it felt far longer than it really was. For that long he had spent all his time with Negan and no one else, and he felt like Negan knew him as if they had been together for years.

It sure felt like it, when Negan whispered how much he loved him, late at night, and thanked him again and again for having stayed with him.

The answer to what they were, though, didn’t come until they had traveled north, had been found by some man named Aaron who convinced them he had no ill will, and drove them to a place called Alexandria as he told them of a group they had taken in some time ago.

“So what are you two, by the way? Friends? Family?”

Rick opened his mouth to answer, but he realized he didn’t know what to say. The sudden materialization of that fact left him a little confused, brow furrowed, and he looked at Negan to see if he was confused as well. However, Negan was looking ahead with a grin on his face.

“Rick’s my husband.”

He said that, simple and plain. Only a second later did Negan seem to realize what he had said, because his eyes widened and there was a fraction of panic when he glanced at Rick.

Rick’s heart was jumping inside his chest, and his voice betrayed him when he tried to speak. Negan was covering his eyes with his hand, jaw tight and tense. His face was tilted away from Rick, as if afraid to find rejection in there. As if Rick would ever do that. It was so uncharacteristic of Negan it almost hurt.

So if Rick’s voice didn’t work, then his body would have to do the part. He swatted Negan’s hand away from his face, and the next thing he knew was that he was kissing Negan with more passion than he ever had, holding the older man’s face between his hands. Negan immediately let the tension slip away, and he kissed back with just as much need.

“Yeah, he’s my husband” Rick commented once the kiss was broken. He met Aaron’s slightly confused eyes on the mirror and grinned. “I swear I still don’t know how it happened.”

The rest of the trip was spent with Rick and Negan smiling faintly at each other, hands touching between them as a little sneak peek of the conversation they would have as soon as they had some privacy. Enough of just being. It was time for them to give some names to quite a few things between them.

Husband, huh? Rick would have preferred for Negan to tell him another way, but if that’s how Negan thought of him, Rick was more than happy to accept the title.

**Author's Note:**

> I am EXTREMELY aware that there's a quite noticeable change of pace and style in the last part. Which should be the bulk of the fic and not anything else. But I just... I guess my brain kinda shut down for that. Might revisit this someday and make it justice. Anyway, hope you still enjoyed it!


End file.
